Star Anise Drying Facility in Guangxi
In Guangxi, a major production area for star anise, known as the “King of Spices,” drying is a crucial step that determines the quality and value of the product. Traditional sun-drying methods are highly weather-dependent, inefficient, and prone to producing discolored or moldy fruit, severely impacting farmers’ income. Recently, a large-scale, 12-meter long x 2.3-meter wide, 6-layer biomass pellet belt dryer, custom-designed by Jinlu Machinery for a leading spice processing company in Guangxi, officially went into operation. With its superior performance and stable operation, it has become the “ace in the hole” for the client, helping them increase production capacity and ensure product quality.
1.Customer Needs
This client is a large-scale star anise purchasing and processing company. With the increasing demand for high-quality star anise in the market, their existing drying equipment faced significant challenges:
Insufficient Capacity: Small dryers could not meet the large-scale processing needs during the peak harvest season, resulting in long processing times and affecting market supply.
High Energy Costs: Using traditional coal-fired or electric heating methods resulted in high drying costs, squeezing profit margins.
Inconsistent Quality: Uneven heat distribution led to inconsistent drying results, with some batches being over-dried or under-dried, affecting the selling price.
Environmental Concerns: The existing system did not meet current environmental standards for clean production, requiring an energy system upgrade.
2.Jinlu’s Customized Solution
After thoroughly understanding the client’s challenges, the Jinlu Machinery technical team conducted on-site research and customized a large-scale, high-efficiency, energy-saving drying solution.
Key Equipment Features:
Customized Size: 12 meters long x 2.3 meters wide, providing a large drying area for high throughput.
Heat Source: Biomass pellet burner, utilizing abundant local forestry waste, resulting in low cost and environmental friendliness.
Control System: Fully automated intelligent temperature and humidity control system for precise control of drying parameters.
Key Advantages of the Solution:
Significantly Increased Capacity and Efficiency:
The 12-meter length and 6-layer belt design greatly increase material retention time and drying area, allowing for processing up to XX tons of fresh star anise per day (specific data can be added based on actual capacity). This perfectly solves the client’s capacity issues during peak harvest season. Precise Temperature Control, Superior Quality:
To meet the specific drying requirements of star anise—requiring low-temperature, slow drying to maintain its vibrant green color and rich aroma—this equipment utilizes a multi-stage temperature control system and a scientific hot air circulation system. Hot air circulates evenly from bottom to top, penetrating each layer of the conveyor belt carrying the star anise, ensuring uniform dehydration at the optimal temperature and airflow. The result is a product with a vibrant green color, pure aroma, and a high percentage of fully opened star anise, significantly enhancing product quality and market competitiveness.
Biomass Energy, Economical and Environmentally Friendly:
Using biomass pellets as the heat source reduces operating costs by approximately 50-60% compared to traditional electric heating, and is more environmentally friendly than coal. This aligns with national green development policies, helping customers achieve both economic and social benefits.
Automated Operation, Labor-Saving:
From material feeding, conveying, drying, to product discharge, the entire process is fully automated and continuous, requiring only 1-2 operators. This significantly reduces labor intensity and costs, while minimizing quality fluctuations caused by human intervention.
3.Customer Feedback
In the customer’s modern processing plant, this large-scale Golden Road dryer is operating smoothly. Fresh star anise is evenly distributed onto the first layer of the conveyor belt by a feeder, and slowly moves through various drying zones. Finally, at the discharge point, perfectly dried star anise of uniform quality is automatically collected.
The customer representative commented: “Our collaboration with Golden Road Machinery has been very pleasant. They truly understood our star anise drying needs, and this customized equipment has exceeded our expectations. Not only has production increased, but, more importantly, the drying quality is extremely stable, with our premium grade star anise yield increasing by nearly 20%. Using biomass pellets also saves a significant amount on fuel costs; this equipment is our most worthwhile investment this year.”